Our Talks and Videos

The Old Rectory on Friday 16th May when Dael Fairbairn, principal of award-winning Erasmus Fairbairn Architects, will tell us how she came to be entrusted with the restoration and transformation of The Old Rectory into a luxury boutique hotel.

Known for their meticulous attention to detail, Fairbairn’s firm specializes in creating buildings that embody the genius loci (spirit of place) in every project they undertake.

In 1862 The Read family purchased the farm Matjesfontein on the east side of the Keurbooms river from the Jerling family. They eventually owned all the land from the Keurbooms River to Arch Rock. They later extended their property interests inland towards the Crags. The farmhouse on Woodlands farm, now called Kurland was built by the Reads in 1886.

This alarming headline was widely distributed in November 1899 after Churchill’s capture by a Boer commando and subsequent daring escape. Rodney Grosskopff will describe how a young Winston Churchill in his days in the British Army working as a war correspondent for...

Summary of a talk given by D.J. CulpinThe French traveller and ornithologist, François Le Vaillant, wrote one of the most important eighteenth-century accounts of a visit to the southern Africa.In 1790 he published his Journey into th Interior of Africa by way of the...

Speaker: Philip CaveneyThis is a short account of the woodcutter settlements in the southern Cape and the e.orts made by the Cape authorities to improve the living standards of the woodcutters by settling them at selected locations on clearings abutting the indigenous...

Speaker: Brenda SheperdIt was a volatile time in South Africa at the outbreak of the First World War. Only 12 years had passed since the end of the Anglo Boer War which had bitterly divided the nation.Those South Africans of British descent and Afrikaners loyal to...

Well-known Plett thespian, raconteur and committee member of The Van Plettenberg  Historical Society, David Hall-Green, tells us about the ill-fated Portuguese ship, known to us as the “San Gonzales”,  which ran into serious trouble in our bay. 1630: Padrão of the São...

Our final event for the year at Fairview Estate was a resounding success. The weather behaved, and we sat on the terrace feasting our eyes on the Tsitsikama mountains while listening to Andrew Rattray’s fascinating tales. Andrew’s talk was followed by a delicious...